Now's the Time To Plant Cool Season Crops

There are two different types of vegetables you can grow in your garden: cool season and warm season.  Cool season crops include Arugula, Lettuce, Spinach, Chard, Onions, Cabbage, Peas and Kale.  Cool season crops will germinate in cold soil and mature in cooler weather and shorter periods of daylight, meaning they are perfect for planting in early spring. All this means you can get an early start on your edible garden by planting cool season crops as soon as the soil in is unfrozen and workable. 

Begin by working two to three inches of organic material into your garden bed. This is called amending the soil. Our high-quality organic soil amendments are produced locally and come bagged for your convenience. For an existing garden, spread two to three inches of organic amendments on the surface of your garden bed and work it in. A single bag of Earth Essentials Sheep, Peat and Compost will cover ten square feet, two inches deep. 

This is also a good time to add some organic fertilizer. Organic fertilizers will carry the OMRI seal on the bag. OMRI stands for Organic Material Review Institute. Products with the OMRI seal have gone through rigorous testing to assure the ingredients are organic. Place a small amount of organic fertilizer in the bottom of each row or planting hole, so the roots of your new plants can grow into it. 

Cool season crops can be planted from seed or from starts. If you choose to plant from starts, take the time to acclimate your seedlings by gradually increasing their exposure to the outdoors. Moving your plants from the house or greenhouse directly into the garden without giving them time to adjust will set your plants back weeks due to transplant shock. This slow transition from indoors to the outside is called “hardening off”. Hardening off plants gradually exposes them to outdoor light, wind and temperatures. The process is easy, but it takes time. On the first day, pick a sheltered, shady spot under a tree or on the patio and leave them there for 3 or 4 hours. The second day, move them into the morning sun for 5 or 6 hours. On the third day, move your starts into full sun. On the fourth day, leave your plants out for the night. By the fifth day, you should be ready to plant. Onions can also be planted now. Choose from seed, sets and plants. 

We are OPEN and HEALTHY

We are OPEN, we are HEALTHY and we are ready to help you in any way that we can. We are thankful to have such dedicated customers and employees who we care about greatly. Your health and success are important to us. As we work through these uncertain times, we can take solace in our daily work. There is no better respite from an uncertain world than to dig in the dirt and connect with nature. To make things easier for you or anyone who needs assistance we will offer curb-side service. You will be able to call in your order and we will deliver directly to your vehicle. Let's do everything we can to spread a little joy and beauty in our corner of the world. 

4 Steps to a great lawn

The Flower Bin Lawn Care program 2020 

   

In order for your lawn to look its best spring, summer and fall, it needs nutrients. The Flower Bin Lawn Care program is built on the idea that regular fertilization, along with aeration and good mowing and watering practices, is key to maintaining a strong, healthy lawn. A healthy lawn is more likely to have fewer weed and disease problems. The ferti•lome® brand of lawn and garden products is the mainstay of our program and includes four steps designed to keep your lawn healthy throughout the growing season. 

When you purchase all four bags of The Flower Bin Lawn Care program at once, you will save 20% of the cost of the program and you will continue to save 20% on every ferti•lome® product you purchase throughout the year, including a wide selection of garden fertilizers, insect and weed controls. Additionally, you’ll have the satisfaction of knowing you are applying the right product at the right time of the season, when it will benefit your lawn the most. 

The program begins with Step 1, ferti•lome’s® For All Seasons II fertilizer and weed preventer. One of the most effective ways to control weeds in your lawn is to prevent them from showing up in the first place and this product works to keep weed seed from germinating. This includes crabgrass. Step 1 is applied between mid-March and mid-April. 

Step 2 is Weed-Out Plus Lawn Fertilizer. This product works to control weeds you can see. It’s called a post-emergent. This is the product to apply for dandelions, mallow and other weeds you can see in your lawn. Weed-Out Plus also feeds your lawn and is applied around the first of June. 

 Step 3 is Lawn Food Plus Iron and this is applied in early August, right when your lawn needs nitrogen and iron. Step 4 is Winterizer and is applied around Halloween, when your grass is storing up energy for the winter weather ahead.  Your lawn will green up faster, the following spring.  Stop by and learn how The Flower Bin Lawn Care program will help your lawn become thicker, healthier and more weed and disease resistant, this season.   

  

  

March Garden Chores

Warm days in early March make us eager to get out and start gardening and with the days getting longer, it’s the perfect opportunity to get the garden ready for the season ahead. Start by gradually removing any vegetation and debris left from last season. It’s important to proceed slowly because as you’re cleaning up, you’ll discover many perennials and bulbs are starting show. The remains of last year’s garden acts as a mulch, protecting early spring risers such as hyacinths, daffodils and tulips. 

Go gently around these bulbs and perennials, because it’s easy to damage them. You may want to switch from a leaf rake to a leaf blower or better yet, simply clean up by hand. It’s important to leave some cover to protect these tender starts through the rest of the spring. Stay off those areas of the garden that are wet, in order to avoid compacting the garden soil any more than necessary. Now’s the time to evaluate the soil in your vegetable beds. Soil texture and richness are fundamental to your vegetable garden’s success and testing is something that should be done on a regular basis. Whether you’ve experienced specific problems, such as Tomato Blossom End Rot or you’ve been disappointed in your garden’s overall yields, it’s important to establish a baseline, in order to know how to proceed to improve your soil. You can do this yourself with a simple test kit or you can send a soil sample to the labs at Colorado State University. You’ll get a very comprehensive soil analysis from the labs at CSU. Once you’ve received your test results, bring the report in. We’ll help you choose the products you need in order to implement the changes they recommend. 

Building soil quality and health is a matter of adding organic materials, called amendments. Common soil amendments include compost, peat moss and earthworm castings, but before you try digging in your garden make sure the ground is workable. Those areas exposed to the sun should be okay to dig in. More shaded parts of the garden are still too wet to work. A simple way to tell if your soil is dry enough is to grab a handful of soil and squeeze it. If it crumbles when you open your hand the soil is workable. If it stays in a clump, the soil is too wet and you need to wait. 

In your perennial gardens, now is the time to prune back ornamental grasses. They do best if you cut them down to five or six inches above the ground. Other summer flowering shrubs such as Buddleia and Caryopteris should also be pruned now. Wait to prune spring blooming shrubs such as Lilac, Forsythia, Spirea until after they bloom. Hold off pruning your roses until mid-April. Watch for perennial weeds that may have wintered over. Groundsel, Mallow and others can survive the harshest winter weather and many are blooming right now. Dig them up or treat with Burnout weed control. Starting your clean up now will mean a more productive gardening season.   When you're done with cleanup, plant some onions and cool weather crops like lettuce and spinach and add a flat of pansies for spring color. 

Get to Know Your Garden Soil

 The quality of your soil has a profound effect on everything you grow in your vegetable garden. Two key elements affecting our soils are the clay content and soil pH.  Here’s a quick test for you to determine the makeup of your soil. You need a clean jar with a lid, some dish soap and water. Put 4-5 ounces of soil in the bottom of the jar. Add enough water to fill the jar 2/3 full.  Add a drop or two of dishwasher soap. Put the lid on and shake well. Let sit undisturbed for 24 hours. 

You’ll see that the soil has settled into layers. The first layer will be sand. The second layer will be silt, followed by clay, suspended clay, then a small amount of organic material, floating at the top. This is evident in the jar on the left. Typically, you’re going to see a small amount of sand and silt, a large percentage of clay and a small amount of organic material. As you add more organic material, your test results will look more like the jar in the middle. The jar on the right illustrates a well-amended garden soil: dark and rich, with more organic material suspended in with the clay. 

Along with soil texture, the pH of your soil one of the most important factors influencing your gardening success. Soil pH affects the availability of nutrients to plants, as well as the microbial activity in your soil.  No matter the quality of the fertilizer or supplements you apply, plants can’t use them if the pH is too high.  Soil pH is a measure of the acidity or alkalinity of a soil. Think of it as how "sour" or "sweet " your soil is. On the pH scale, 7.0 is neutral, above 7 is alkaline, below 7 is acidic. Bleach for example is very alkaline. Lemon juice is very acidic. Most plants prefer a pH of between 6.5 and 7. Our soils are typically greater than 7.  

Home test kits are a quick and relatively easy way to get a reading on pH and soil nutrients.  For a more complete understanding of your soil, we recommend you get a soil test analysis from the laboratory at Colorado State University. You can pick up a mailer and test instructions in the Hardgoods section of the store. The mailer is free, but you do pay a fee to CSU for the test.  In return, you will receive a comprehensive analysis of your soil. Whether you test your own soil or use the lab at CSU, bring us the results. We'll recommend the right amendments to make your garden soil healthier and more productive. As a general rule, to improve your garden soil and lower the pH, you need to add more organic material in the form of peat moss, coconut coir, sheep manure and organic compost. We recommend you add two to three inches of organic material to your garden in the spring and again in the fall.